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Creating a world that is not only sustainable but regenerative extends past our plates into what we wear. With the rise of fast fashion and unchecked consumerism, buying quality, real leather goods is one way to make your wardrobe more sustainable. 

You can read my article here about the problems in the textile industry and how many of the “ethical” or “better” options fall short.  One solution is long lasting quality goods made from leather. 

A few years ago the Savory Institute connected me with Janet Hamilton, owner of Farrier Leather, a company dedicated to making sustainable vegetable tanned leather goods. Janet makes beautiful, functional pieces from responsibly sourced materials and continues to strive for higher standards as availability improves.

Join my co host, Lauren Manning and Janet as they discuss the role of real leather in the sustainability movement and other topics:

• Why Janet started Farrier Leather and the barriers she faced finding well-sourced raw materials
• The benefits  of  traditional vegetable tanning methods over current methods using chromium salts
• Other brands that are concerned with leather sourcing
• The good and the bad about sustainable materials becoming more mainstream
• Correcting misconceptions about leather and highlighting the problems with vegan leather
• How to start making more sustainable choices – and it’s not throwing out all your clothes and starting over
• Sometimes the most sustainable choice is choosing not to buy 
• It’s about better choices, not perfect choices. Define your personal priorities
• It’s not used. It’s vintage!
• How Janet learned how to make leather goods
• Janet’s favorite leather items

Resources:

• Leather Working Group  
• Pennyroyal Designs
• Savory Institute
• Modal fabric
• Poshmark
• Thredup
• Rent the Runway
• Leatherworking group on Reddit
• Leatherworker.net

Connect with Janet:

Website: Farrier Leather

Instagram: @farrier_leather

Facebook: Farrier Leather

Twitter: @Farrier_Leather

Pinterest: Farrier Leather 

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Episode Credits:

Thank you to all who’ve made this show possible. Our hosts are Diana Rodgers, Lauren Manning, and James Connelly. Our producer is Meg Chatham, and our editor is Emily Soape. And of course, we are grateful for our sponsors, Patreon supporters, and listeners.

This episode is sponsored by Paleovalley, my go-to, grab-and-go source for products that prioritize nutrient density in an industry that prioritizes everything else. Their epic lineup of products includes Organic Supergreens, 100% Grass-Fed Beef Sticks, Grass-Fed Organ Complex, 100% Grass-Fed Bone Broth Protein, and low-sugar snack bars. Visit their website here and enter the code SUSTAINABLEDISH for 15% off your first order.

Quotes:

“You can see why from a business perspective, most tanneries would have shifted to chromium tanning because they can tan more hides more quickly for less of an overhead. But it uses these heavy chemical salts that then sometimes pollute the waterways or local livestock in various regions that don’t have safety measures, environmental safety measures put in place” – Janet Hamilton

“I think people forget that the hide is actually once it’s turned into a beautiful bag, or a saddle or a pair of boots, or wallet. That’s an upcycled product. I think people fail to see that.” – Lauren Manning

“There’s so many aspects of sustainability outside of just the material itself. We’re not thinking about labor. And we’re not thinking about the people who make our items. We’re not thinking about our local economies, we’re not thinking about who it includes and who it excludes.” – Janet Hamilton

“I don’t want to say that you should never buy fast fashion because then by doing that, it’s very exclusive, because fast fashion is less expensive.” – Janet Hamilton

“There is no perfect we’re always taking. It’s just always about doing better. If you’re always striving to question, am I doing the best I can with what I have and where I am in life? And how can I do better? I think that is the most sustainable mindset.” – Janet Hamilton

“There’s always buying used. I always like to call it vintage, even if it was like last year’s style and I buy it used, I’m like it’s vintage.” – Janet Hamilton

“I think people forget that. It’s not necessarily about what you buy. It’s what you don’t buy sometimes that matters.” – Janet Hamilton

 

Transcript:

Lauren Manning  0:00  

Hi, everybody. Welcome to the Sustainable Dish Podcast. I’m your host Lauren Manning and today we’re going to talk about something really exciting. We’re going to talk about sustainable fashion, specifically leather. I’m joined by Janet Hamilton, who owns Farrier Leather. Hi, Janet. 

Janet Hamilton  0:14  

Hi. 

Lauren Manning  0:15  

How are you doing today?

Janet Hamilton  0:16  

I’m well. 

Lauren Manning  0:18  

Great. Well, I think the best place for us to start is for you to tell us what is Farrier Leather.

Janet Hamilton  0:24  

Farrier Leather started as a bag brand, we do some small goods as well. But my main focus and goal with Farrier Leather is to have high and heirloom quality handbags that are produced sustainably, through materials labor, and function.

Lauren Manning

That sounds really simple. But there’s a lot more complexity behind that what led you to this realm of sustainable leather?

Janet Hamilton

Well, actually, I’m super passionate about the food space, specifically meat and properly raised sustainable meat sourcing. And when I started to think about things, I felt like that area was pretty well covered. So I was like, how else can I support this movement for regenerative or sustainable animal production? And so I started looking at different byproducts. At the same time, I was a new mom, and I couldn’t find a handbag I liked. And I was like, Why doesn’t anybody make leather handbags that are vegetable tanned? So I sort of was like, well, maybe this is what I’m supposed to do. I kind of marry all of those things into my company. 

Lauren Manning  1:17  

And then when did the business start? 

Janet Hamilton  1:42  

Oh, gosh, technically, I think 2015 but there was some research going on and 2013 – 2014

Lauren Manning

Sure. So you’ve been around for a while now. When you first started on this journey of like filling this sustainable bag space, what were some of the first things you encountered as you started digging into this and saying, you know, is this possible? Can I create this company? Do these supply chains even exist?

Janet Hamilton

Well, the first thing I found out was the reason why I couldn’t find a bag that I wanted and that I was looking for is because they don’t exist. So then, I started to think about the bigger broader picture. I’m like, Okay, well, people are raising animals in a way that I would want to source leather from, but why can’t I get this leather? So then I started contacting tanneries, and the tanneries were like well, traceability is not really a thing. We can’t really guarantee where our hides come from. And then I started getting into the details of tanning, and the various types. So most leather is tanned with chromium salts, which is not a traditional way to tan, the traditional way would be either brain tanning or vegetable tanning, which all farriers products are vegetable tanned, and what that means is that they use tannins from plants usually tree bark to stabilize the fibers within a hide that it doesn’t decompose. So finding tanneries that vegetable tanned specifically was also difficult because most tanneries have shifted to chromium tanning. You can chromium tan, a hide in one day and vegetable tanning takes anywhere from 30 days to I’ve seen there’s a tannery in Europe. They tan their hides for a year. Most are around 60 days, though. Yeah, so you can see why from a business perspective, most tanneries would have shifted to chromium tanning because they can tan more hides more quickly for less of an overhead. But it uses these heavy chemical salts that then sometimes pollute the waterways or local livestock in various regions that don’t have maybe safety measures, environmental safety measures put in place. 

Lauren Manning  3:59  

So when you decided that you wanted to stick to vegetable tanned hides, how easy was it for you to find those?

Janet Hamilton  4:04  

So there are vegetable tanneries, but they being a very traditional form of tanning, and you get basically two options so you can go international, and then there’s often a language barrier, at least for me. I only unfortunately only speak one language. And then domestically. It’s for lack of a better term. It’s kind of like a good old boys business. So a lot of the vegetable tanneries in the US that those hides go to boots, sporting goods, men’s wear, saddles, other type of equestrian or workwear. So when you call them and you’re talking about handbags, sometimes you get met with a little bit of pause on the phone conversation. So then I tried to reach out to designers or makers, production facilities. And within that space, I really wanted to make sure that I was using fair and safe labor and that, you know, the people who would help me produce would be doing it responsibly for the humans involved. And so I started with a few small makers internationally and quickly realized that there’s a lot of logistics with importing and exporting, as well as currency differences and all of that kind of thing. So then I tried to use domestic production facilities. I drove up to New York. I drove to New Jersey. I called places in LA. And what I quickly realized was that just because it’s domestic It doesn’t mean the labor is right. And they often don’t have as many detailed connections as far as sourcing materials I had hoped so I kind of put the labor on the backburner and kept at the the leather front. There is an International Leather Auditing Organization who audits tanneries worldwide. And what they do is the look at many different aspects of tanning, but one of them is traceability. So through that organization, you can only get traceability back to region. And at the time, that was the best I could do. I looked into sourcing hides myself, I drove out to slaughterhouses and farms directly, I offered to drive them myself in my car rawhides up to a small tannery, which would have been an adventure I’m sure, yes, but but even the small chance so the small tanneries that would be able to make beautiful hides, because they are small craft production places, their costs are super high. And to make a bag, you’re looking at several square foot, roughly 15 to 20 square foot per bag.

Lauren Manning  6:59  

 Wow.

Janet Hamilton  7:00  

So yes, and like some of these craft tanneries that produce absolutely beautiful work, their pricing is like 15 to 20 plus dollars per square foot. So when you start to talk about how do I make this business work with creating the product that I want to create, but also being able to price it at a point where people can actually afford it, it becomes difficult. So I went back to the International Auditing Organization. And I found a place in South America that was able, that was rated like in the high 90 percentile to be able to trace their hides to region and I worked with them on ways that we could discern the closest possible quality of hides from the best possible sourcing without having direct farm names or that kind of thing. So that was a little difficult. So we started there because it was the best I could do at the time. And yes, since then, there have been some changes. But honestly, that hurdle really hasn’t changed. And there’s a small group of makers and brands, not just my own, but I know like Pennyroyal Designs and Common Road. They often experienced the same things. And I get calls all the time from other brands and makers, like hey, do you happen to know anybody and we all kind of work together for this common goal. A friend of mine once said, rising tides floats, all boats, and I kind of have held on to that since then. So it’s a difficult journey. But we’re getting there. And now we have big brands like Timberland, and I believe Ugg, that have worked with some producers to find land market verified through the Savory Institute, regenerative hides, and that kind of thing, which is pretty cool to see, having been on this journey for quite some time.

Lauren Manning    8:51

Now somebody who got into sustainable fashion relatively early, you know now considering that it’s becoming more mainstream, like you mentioned with big name household brands, starting to produce goods at mass scale made out of different types of leather. What have you seen in the last couple years? Do you think there’s a lot of momentum growing behind this idea of sustainable fashion and transparency in you know, better labor conditions? What’s been your perspective as someone who is in the space early on how it’s evolving?

Janet Hamilton    9:19

I think people are becoming aware of the issues, but I think that there’s also greenwashing and I think that there’s a lot of vilification and I think there’s a lot of polarization and very, what I would call like tunnel vision views. So I think it’s growing and I think there are people making the right moves, and I think people are trying, which is awesome. And awareness is being spread both around labor and sourcing materials and also accessibility. So there’s good and there’s bad I think we’re in a very transitional time still, even though it’s more mainstream than it was 10 years ago. 

Lauren Manning  10:01  

Yeah. Is that something that we should be hopeful about? Or is there anything that concerns you when you see big giant brand names get into this space? Especially considering that there is some greenwashing or do you think this is largely all for the good?

Janet Hamilton  10:15  

That is a tough question. I think it’s a little bit of both. When I see big brands, doing good things, I’m hopeful because they have the funding, and they have the scale to make a larger impact. So when you see brands like Timberland, or Eileen Fisher, doing better things, even though it’s not my brand, that’s getting all the sales and press, I’m still pumped, because that means change is happening. And it’s on a much larger scale and causing much bigger impacts than I could cause. But I also see a lot of, of the greenwashing. So people will be like, Oh, well, sustainable, these sustainable leggings are made from bamboo. And now I know that, you know, all of these other plant based fibers, they’re not always sustainable, or beneficial to the ecosystem at all. So I think some brands are preying on people’s good intentions in that way. And the information is not easily found. That’s the other hard part. And you kind of have to like, go out and seek it, you have to like, you know, Google is modal, a sustainable material? And even then, you’re reading through dozens of conflicting articles. So it’s really, it’s a hard space to find yourself in. And then there’s like the vilification. For me personally, with leather, I get a lot of hate for using animal products, instead of using what would be considered vegan alternatives. And that takes a lot of energy and education. And sometimes it goes well, and sometimes it doesn’t. The, and the education that brands like myself put out there, that’s not, that’s what I would call unpaid work. And I’m happy to do it, because I want to see the change. But it’s a lot of energy that goes into teaching people about what they can’t see. And this kind of goes hand in hand with like the food industry as well. Since both textiles and food kind of come from plants and animals. You know, you have people that think leather products are from animals that were killed just for their skin. And I don’t know anybody that could like skin a live cow, that would not end well. But that is something that’s been said to me several times and I’m like, well I saw some video on the internet. And I’m like, I’m pretty sure that cow would annihilate that person if they attempted to do that. It doesn’t really seem but then there’s also they’re like, well, but then you know that like the leather industries, you know, taking all these animal lives, but they’re not. Leather is a byproduct of the meat industry along with tons of other things. I I’ve been to these slaughterhouses myself, and I’ve seen them they’re asking me for my help. They’re saying, you know, who can we get to take our hides because they just they go in the dumpster, we can only sell so much and, and that sort of thing. So you know, these hides, they exist, and they’re there. And specifically on the leather leather front, vilifying it in that way, it just makes no sense. And then you have companies out there trying to create vegan leathers, which are either plastic based, or they require heavy amounts of processing to create a product that’s not going to decompose. Whether it’s the apple leather, or the pineapple leather, or the mushroom leather, or the cactus leather, like all of those things in nature, if you cut if you left an apple in your yard, it would be gone in a week. These things they decompose. So what are they doing to these products to these plant products that will keep them from decomposing? And how much plastic are they using? How much energy are they using in a lab space? How much how many man? How much manpower, or water or all of these other things are they using to create one simple product? When farming livestock you know it, you could argue that it uses resources like land use and water and things like that. But a lot of those things when they are when they’re done like the water comes… A lot of the land that grazing animals can be grazed on is not is non arable land so it’s not land that could be cropped or more built on easily. And then in some places, water is still abundant. Here on the east coast where I’m located, we get regular rain. We don’t have issues like some of the Midwest does and things like that. And then there’s the argument of course that through proper grazing techniques that you could, you know, increase water retention and all that but I’m kind of going off on a tangent.

Lauren Manning  15:04  

Oh, no, not at all. Not at all. 

Janet Hamilton  15:06  

But uh, so I think that there are non animal product alternatives for people who want to go that route. But I don’t think the sustainable way is through plastics or pineapple, apple, mushroom cactus based leather. And if you want to make the argument about food, why are we trying to create textiles from actual foods? So that’s a big question I have with those and none of those places, disclose their entire process of how those are made. And that also makes me question I understand that there’s probably like, patent or trademark issues there. But there’s a lot of there’s a lot of questions.

Lauren Manning  15:52  

Yeah, you know, with vegan alternatives. I think that too, you know, we can eat mushrooms and pineapples. But we can make delicious tequila out of cactuses. But we can’t necessarily eat animal hides. And I think people forget that the hide is actually once it’s turned into a beautiful bag, or a saddle or a pair of boots, or wallet. That’s an upcycled product. I think people fail to see that. And I think a large reasons you touched on is the transparency issue. And it’s just like the food system. You know, we’ve outsourced our apparel manufacturing all over the globe. And people understand so little about how clothing gets to the sales rack that it’s hard for them to know is this greenwashing you know, what is this pineapple leather? What is real leather? They don’t understand a lot about the process. As you’ve worked to educate people, have you found any ways of explaining it, or any tricks to try and get people to understand that, you know, hides are actually upcycled into durable leather goods that can last for generations.

Janet Hamilton  16:51  

I mean, really just sharing my experience with actually going to farms to slaughterhouses. And seeing it firsthand, and then asking them questions that make them think. So I think that that’s a big part of what sustainability misses is questioning, I think we should always be questioning things and questioning ourselves, but not in a judgmental way, but out of a way of curiosity. So when someone is like, well, but they’re killing animals for their skins, and I asked them, like, how much do you think a farmer makes from just a hide? Um, especially when meat prices are what they are? And you know, that kind of usually stops them in their tracks? That’s usually the question that’s like, well, and I’m like, do you know that most farmers don’t make anything at all from the hide? So they put all of this time and effort into raising an animal, and then they will get nothing? It kind of just stops feeling like, Oh, well, wait a second. And then you start to say, well, when you when a cow is taken in to be culled, obviously, the meat goes for food, and whether human or pet. And then but what happens to all the other parts? And if we just throw them away, then is that honoring animal’s life is that is that wasteful, is that? I often ask them, like, what would you suggest that we do with these other parts? And it kind of just makes people think and I think that questioning people in a way that’s not you’re not tearing them down, but you’re asking them to consider what they can’t see. 

Lauren Manning  18:35  

To the extent a consumer has you know, said Okay, I understand we’ve got some sustainability issues in clothing and accessories. I’d like to try and do better about this, you know, should they go home and throw their whole closet out and start over? Should they try and make their own clothes? How do you suggest to people to embark on this journey? What’s the best way to try and think more sustainably about the clothing you use?

Janet Hamilton  18:59  

Well, first off, don’t throw away anything that you… don’t throw out your closet. When I think about the first step in sustainability, I actually think about self acceptance. And you might be like, Well what if like what do you mean self acceptance and what I mean by that is taking a look at who you are and how you move through the world and the example there would be I am very rough on my things and I don’t mean to be and I have some nice things and I like to take care of them. But I’m just generally rough like I will have on nice shoes and then I will remember that I needed to put something in the compost and I’ll like run in the backyard in you know, like satin heels or something. It’s just how it’s just how I am. So self acceptance as like who and how you move through the world. And then your, your budget, your your economic status, not everyone can afford on bag that is several hundred dollars. Not everyone can afford a dress that is $300. So finding where you’re comfortable spending, and then also acceptance in what your accessibility is, I live near a major city right now. So I things are highly accessible to me, but somebody in the middle of nowhere Oklahoma or Montana, they might not have the same resources. The internet does offer some help there. You can always get delivery on things, but even that it’s never instant. And then you’re, you’re having to make like purchases further out and seek out those brands in a less accessible easy way. So I think that self acceptance is the first thing,

Lauren Manning  20:46  

Right. And I think people are struggling too. And I just watched a documentary about this with the rise of fast fashion. And for people who don’t know, the term fast fashion is just you know, clothing companies that very quickly tap into existing fashion trends and churn out 10s of skews of new types of clothing, and they sell them very cheaply online or in a store. And it’s kind of a churn and burn type approach to clothing. And consumers are just amassing huge wardrobes. and sustainability, labor conditions don’t seem to be a priority for a lot of these brands. But, you know, in our in our day of consumerism and social media and wanting to look cool and be on trend, you know, I can see how it’s tempting to folks. How do you feel about fast fashion and trying to compete, that very quick narrative with things like sustainable fashion?

Janet Hamilton  21:35  

It’s hard because everybody you know, you do want to look fashionable. I think, personally, I tried to buy timeless, that works for my life. So I’m a work from home mom and I also urban farm. So a lot of times, I’m in leggings and a tank top. But I like to have nicer things when I go out. And as far as fast fashion goes, I try. I would say there’s I have a personal hierarchy of priorities when it comes to purchasing. And this is something else that I think is really good to think about. So what are the priorities that are important to you? Is it sourcing, whether that’s like fabrics or locality? Is it labor? Is it the item longevity? Is it diversity, and inclusivity, functionality, price per wear, repairability? All of these kinds of things. So we think when it comes to certain things, especially like basics, t shirts, just like white t shirts, underwear, things, everybody socks, things, everybody needs. That kind of thing. When I can buy better, or when I know that it’s going to be worth more money then I will happily dish it out, like I we buy some form of wool or alpaca socks every year, because they keep you so much warmer. And there they are a lot more expensive. But sometimes, as far as fast fashion goes. And this is debatable if it’s fast fashion or not. Especially being a mom of a nine year old, who’s rambunctious and pretty much lives outside almost feral, sometimes we are places where I have bought her a T shirt from Walmart and I when I when I go below what would be my ideal, I looked at my personal priorities. So for her, I try not to ever buy polyester. So if I am buying her pajamas from Target, or Walmart or whatever, I tried to buy 100% cotton. It’s not always organic cotton, it’s not always great labor. But I try to hit at least a few of the points that I care about. So whether it’s material locality, functionality, all of those kinds of things. There’s so many aspects of sustainability outside of just the material itself. We’re not thinking about labor. And we’re not thinking about the people who make our items. We’re not thinking about our local economies, we’re not thinking about who it includes and who it excludes. When we think about functionality, which is really another really big thing that I focus on as a brand. But also, it’s really important to think about for your purchases. If something’s not functional for you, you’re not going to use it, and then it becomes waste. So you could buy like this amazing, bright yellow shoes that are super fashionable right now. But can you wear them every day? Can you wear them even once a week? Are they really only good for one outfit? Things like that. So like how many wears can you get out of them or if it’s repairable or not. That’s part of the reason why I really like leather bags is that they’re sturdy, and they’re usually repairable. So if a rivet breaks, if the stitch pops, if a piece of the hardware gives out eventually, these are all things that you can repair and keep it.

Lauren Manning  25:10  

Those are really helpful tips.

Janet Hamilton  25:12  

Yeah. So with fast fashion, if that is the route that you’re going, you know, you can like, look through your personal list of priorities about what matters to you, and see what you can hit. See how many points you can hit. Because it’s, it’s, I don’t want to say that like, you should never buy fast fashion because then by doing that, that’s, it’s very, it’s very exclusive, because fast fashion is less expensive. And I grew up low income. So I know what it’s like to not ever have shoes that were you know, my parents didn’t care where my shoes came from. They if they weren’t hand-me-downs, they were from Walmart, that sort of thing. So it’s not, it’s not always about being perfect, because that’s the other thing about sustainable fashion. There is no perfect we’re always taking to make something. And even if it’s like the, the most regenerative fabrics, sewn by the most highest paid and well cared for labor, what machine are they sewn like sewn on? Where was that machine made? Who made that machine? Who made the thread? You can just keep going back, going back going back. And there is no perfect we’re always taking. It’s just always about doing better. So you always, if you’re always striving to question, am I doing the best I can with what I have and where I am in life? And how can I do better? I think that is most sustainable mindset.

Lauren Manning  26:41  

Right. And that’s a really healthy, that’s a mindset that you can stick with. And I think people fall into the same trap of perfection, pursuit of perfection when it comes to their diets. You know, they think I need to shop only at the farmers market cook every meal at home sourcing from my food, but that’s exhausting that can become a full time job. Not to mention a little bit pricier.

Janet Hamilton  27:01  

Exactly. And detrimental to your own self. I mean, that’s really not healthy. Yeah, it’s really not a healthy mindset to constantly be berating yourself over. Like, ah, this isn’t perfect. You know, that kind of thing. But there are ways to also make more sustainable choices. Even if you can’t hit like these points. There’s always buying used. I always like to call it vintage, even if it was like last year style. And I buy it used, I’m like it’s vintage. Yeah, and there’s a lot of even if you so I living near a major city, the thrift shops around me are full of like super awesome stuff like 100%, cashmere sweaters, and all that kind of thing. But even if that’s not accessible to you, there’s websites now where it’s a consumer to consumer transaction like Poshmark or Thredup. I have bought a ton of silk tank tops on Poshmark. I love silk tank tops because they keep me warmer in the winter, under whatever else I’m wearing. And I don’t have the budget to buy 10 brand new tank tops. But I can keep those from becoming part of like the landfill situation by purchasing them from someone who’s like I don’t really wear this and they can make a few dollars and I get a new shirt and everybody wins.

Lauren Manning  28:24  

You know and the the thinking carefully about what you buy is something that I realized recently that there’s a lot of things in my closet that I was very lukewarm on. And I’d say to myself, why did I buy this? You know, I didn’t love it. I didn’t know I was going to wear it. But for some reason, I still bought it and I started thinking when I was looking for clothing like do you actually really love this? Are you going to want to wear it for several seasons to come? And I think it’s that that fast fashion trendiness mentality like, you know, we’re always just kind of in that consumerism mindset where we want to buy new things are the next thing or, you know, keep adding to our wardrobe. But oftentimes, there’s great use pieces out there that you might love even more.

Janet Hamilton  29:02  

Absolutely, absolutely. And very much so agree with you on the whole, like, I look at my closet, and there’s things in there that I have lukewarm feelings. Yeah, I think that that’s super common. Sometimes we buy things because of, you know, like, we’re out shopping with a friend and you’re just like feeling good, and the psychology behind purchasing things. It does make you feel good. Like there’s tons of research on that out there. So sometimes we make these choices, you know, without, they’re more like impulsive choices. And whether it’s, you know, like what’s in fashion this week, or it’s just like, who you are and where you are at that moment when you bought it type thing. And sometimes shopping your own closet can be like the best start.

Lauren Manning  29:49  

And I think we have this compulsion always need a new outfit for something like you know, if you have to go to a wedding or you have to go to a work event. We have this minds like oh I need to find something to wear for that. It’s like we have this allergy to being seen in the same outfit more than three times. And maybe that’s a byproduct of social media, like lives being more digitized, spread out through the world. I don’t know what that’s about. But it’s really curious how we feel like we constantly need to be presenting ourselves in some new kind of outfit, even if it’s the same people we see all the time. You know, they’re not really thinking, Oh, she’s worn that dress three times before how dare she?

Janet Hamilton  30:24  

Exactly. Yeah, I I’m not sure if that’s like strictly on mentality in the United States, or if that’s worldwide, but Yeah, we do. And there, there are alternatives to that as well. Like there’s Rent the Runway if you’re going to like a formal event. And that’s pretty cool. Because then you can like, you can wear something that is way out of your budget, because it’s a rental and that I’ve had tons of friends use that service. It’s super awesome. You can do it that way. And then a lot of times my local neighborhood has a Buy Nothing group. And sometimes people will post I’m this size and I have this event. Does anybody have anything that they don’t want anymore? And people just put it out there like yeah, porch pickup, come get it. And that’s really all great. Yeah, great. So I don’t think sustainability always has to be about purchasing but when you do purchase it would be purchased better. And then if you can access without purchasing, like, that’s a totally valid avenue.

Lauren Manning  31:22  

I think people forget that. It’s not necessarily about what you buy. It’s what you don’t buy sometimes it matters. 

Janet Hamilton  31:27  

Exactly. 

Lauren Manning  31:28  

Before we wrap up, I want to ask you how you learned to work with leather. I did a little bit of hide tanning early on in my farm career before I got burnt out doing it and working with leather is not always the easiest thing. How did you learn how to make these beautiful bags?

Janet Hamilton  31:44  

Well, first Thank you. It is very difficult. I was… I knew how to sew fabric before and I thought well, it couldn’t be that hard. I can hand sew fabric and machine sew fabric but it is way different. First off, if you put a stitch hole in leather, it doesn’t. You can’t like remove it like that hole. It’s just there. You have very little room for mistakes. But also it’s just it’s a much hardier material. The sewing machines for leather are massive, heavy pieces of equipment. And honestly, they’re a little bit scary with the motors that are on them. I learned through asking a lot of questions and a lot of YouTube and a lot of mistakes. I have plenty of bags and pieces in a box in my basement right now that I could never sell because they look so terrible. But you get better like with anything so and there are really the leather working community is super supportive. There’s the Leather Group on Reddit. There’s several Facebook groups for leather crafting, there’s leather worker dotnet. And mostly you can just reach out to people and ask most of the questions I get through social media on my Farrier page. They’re usually like hey, I like what you’re doing but I don’t like your bags. Can you recommend other brands which I’m always happy to. Or there are oh how did you make that? Like I’m trying to make something similar? How did you get the handle this way? How did you get the stitch that way and that kind of thing. So yeah, it’s just a lot of being open. And then being open to asking.

Lauren Manning  33:30  

 What’s your favorite piece that you make or a favorite item? What’s your favorite thing to put together with leather?

Janet Hamilton  33:35  

 To make? Hmm, probably the simplest bags because I try to do something small and fun with them. So on top of the bags that I have on my site, I also always offer custom work and I’ve made just tiny crossbody bags that it’s just two simple pockets zip top but they’ll request something super fun like Harry Potter fabric inside the lining or I recently had someone reach out to me looking for a tote that they could tote whiskey bottles in so that they wouldn’t clank together. Those are fun to me because it takes a lot of creativity. There’s always a lot of mistakes. There may or may not be a lot of cussing. But they’re fun because they’re they’re new and they’re novel. But my favorite thing to carry is probably my wallet bag. I was never a crossbody person and then after I made that bag I was like why was I never a crossbody person. I have my hands free again. 

Lauren Manning  34:37  

Freedom. Yes. I’ve got one of your journal covers and it’s beautiful and this may sound strange but if there’s other people out there I’m sure will relate but I love smelling it the smell of leather is just I don’t know what it is about it but I love the smell of it. The feel of it. It’s just so high quality. It’s a great piece. I love it.

Janet Hamilton  34:56  

Oh thank you. Yes, the smell is intoxicating for sure.

Lauren Manning  35:00  

It is well before we say goodbye Why don’t you tell everybody where they can find you –  either website or social media. How can they get in touch?

Janet Hamilton  35:07  

Farrier Leather dot com and then I’m just at Farrier underscore Leather on social media feel free to reach out say hi ask questions.

Lauren Manning  35:17  

Janet thank you so much this gave me a lot to think about in terms of sustainable fashion and shopping. I’m sure everybody else got some great tips too. I look forward to catching up with you in the future

Janet Hamilton  35:26  

Sounds great